


Only one of us

by Lenore



Category: The Prestige (2006)
Genre: Backstory, Incest, M/M, Obsession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-01
Updated: 2011-09-01
Packaged: 2017-10-23 06:52:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/247423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lenore/pseuds/Lenore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They learn to live as if they are part man, part ghost, and there is only one of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Only one of us

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a [](http://yuletide.livejournal.com/profile)[**yuletide**](http://yuletide.livejournal.com/) Treat for my dear [](http://linaerys.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://linaerys.livejournal.com/)**linaerys**.

They learn early to fear raised voices. Or maybe it's simply an instinct born in the blood. Either way, they know to hide when the deep growl of Mr. Sampson's voice seeps through the chinks in the wall. There's a little niche between the window casement and the old oak dresser. Alfred climbs in first, and Fallon squeezes in next to him. They stay still and silent and strain to listen.

"What good's a whore that's got brats practically hanging off her tits? One would be bad enough. But, hell, two of them…"

Maude's voice is lower, but no less dangerous. Alfred doesn't have to hear what she says to know what it all means: They're going to have to leave this place too, and Maude is going to be mad again.

The argument goes on a little longer, slowly losing steam until it sounds like a snake hissing, and then the bedroom door bangs open. Fallon grabs onto Alfred's hand, and they wait.

There's silence for a moment, but the air has a charge to it, like a few nights ago when the thunder was loud enough to shake the room and Fallon whimpered in his sleep until it stopped.

"You think you can hide from me?" Alfred can imagine the sneer on Maude's face even if he can't see it. "Get your worthless hides out here!"

They don't move, clinging to one another, hoping that Maude won't find them. But it's not a large room, so few places for her to look, and Maude isn't the sort to be easily thwarted. Alfred listens to the whisper of her skirt as she moves around the room. Soon enough, the heavy curtains are snatched back, and Maude kneels down, sticks her face into the close space where they're cowering, her powdered skin and plucked eyebrows and round, pink cheeks only a breath away. _Mother,_ Alfred thinks, although he doesn't know why. They've never called her that. She's never allowed them to.

"You've gone and done it again, haven't you?" she spits the words at them.

Alfred wants to argue that they haven't done anything, but Maude's mouth is pulled tight and her eyes are hard and too bright. He doesn’t dare say a word.

Maude clamps one hand around Alfred's arm and the other around Fallon's and drags them bodily from their hiding place.

She stares into their faces like she's trying to burn them with her eyes. "From now on, there's only one of you, understand me?"

They don't understand, but she won't let them go until they agree. Her thin fingers press into the flesh of their arms. Alfred nods slowly, and so does Fallon.

"Good," Maude declares and pushes them away from her. "Now get busy helping me pack up our things, and not another word out of either of you, or there'll be no dinner."

* * *

At the new place, the room is smaller, the house dirtier, and as far as anyone knows, only Alfred exists. He and Fallon develop an instinct for never being in the same place at the same time. They learn to live as if they are part boy, part ghost.

The first day, they'd been almost to the door when Maude had stopped suddenly, grabbed Fallon by the collar and pushed him toward a pile of barrels stacked up in the front yard. "Go hide yourself back there and stay put until I come get you."

Fallon's eyes had gone wide and bright with the threat of tears, and Maude had slapped him hard across the face.

"Do as I say, and none of that nonsense. Or do you want us all to starve?"

Fallon scuttered off behind the barrels. They were large and hid him completely, although the soft sounds of sniffling would have given him away if anyone had been paying attention.

Maude knocked at the door of the house. An old woman answered, dressed all in black, a shawl tied about her head, making her yellowed face resemble, to Alfred's imagination at least, a skeleton. He shrank back against Maude's skirts, trying to hide in them. She pinched his neck viciously until he stood up straight.

The old woman looked Maude up and down. "We wanted younger, but 'spose you'll do. It's ten pounds a month for the room. House takes half what you make. Do business off premises, and you're out." She narrowed her eyes at Alfred. "Same goes if this one makes himself a nuisance."

"This is Alfred." Maude pushed him towards the old woman. "He knows how to be useful. Hauling firewood, fetching water, helping in the kitchen. Put him to work however you please."

The old woman bent down until she was eye level with Alfred, peering at him nearly nose to nose for what felt like forever. At last, she sucked her teeth, which must have been some kind of declaration of approval, because she turned and led them inside.

They didn't go get Fallon until after dark, sneaking him up the back stairs to their room. Fallon was shivering, as much from fear as cold, and Alfred kept an arm around his shoulders the whole way there.

In their room, Maude opened the door to the wardrobe and tossed a blanket inside. "I've got work to do so it's to bed with the two of you. Not a peep if you know what's good for you."

She shooed them in and shut them up, turning the key in the lock. They curled around each other. Fallon was still shaking, and Alfred tightened his hold on his brother's waist. Out in the room, there was the sound of the door closing, the creaking of bed springs, and then those strange and familiar noises. Alfred closed his eyes, as if that would make it stop. Fallon pressed closer, tucked his head against Alfred's shoulder, and kissed his neck.

"There's only one of us," Fallon whispered.

It was surprisingly comforting.

* * *

By the time they strike out on their own at sixteen, living one life between them has become a habit they don't question. It's the only way they know how to be. They move from town to town in search of jobs, sometimes legal, sometimes otherwise. At their places of honest employment, they invariably earn a reputation for doing the work of two men, something that makes them smile when they're alone together. And when the police come rousting suspects in the latest string of robberies, there's always a roomful of drinking companions who will swear on a stack of Bibles that Alfred was with them the whole time.

They grow into manhood, dividing their time between the world and the shadows.

It's chance that gets them started in their true profession. In a little town in the north, Fallon takes a job at a sawmill. One night after work, the other millers drag him out to a traveling show. There are the usual freaks and bawdy attractions, Fallon tells Alfred later, and he isn't much interested until he stumbles onto a little old man who calls himself Il Magnifico doing magic. Fallon sits through three shows and hangs around until everyone else has gone, pulling out his flask, drawing Il Magnifico into conversation. By the time he comes home to Alfred, he knows the rudiments of a handful of tricks.

They practice and practice, and they still move from place to place, only now it's to put on a show of their own.

The latest town is called Wasettia, a dismal little collection of buildings plunked down on a plain of mud. It's Alfred's turn to do the act, in the dingy backroom of a bar, because Wasettia doesn't have much else to offer. For a fistful of coins, he guesses cards picked by audience members and pulls a scarf out of his hat and makes a lady's hatpin disappear. When he hands it back, her thumb brushes his palm. He finishes his act, and she lingers, giving him sideways glances that are pure invitation.

He hesitates, because Fallon is waiting and Fallon is never pleased when Alfred comes home smelling of conquest. Usually that would be enough to decide him against taking up the invitation, and it's not as if Alfred has ever really needed anything but his brother. Lately, though, he has felt a tidal shift, something in motion between them, although he can't quite figure out what, and that makes him nervous. They're already a world of one, one face, one name, even one set of thoughts. They still sleep tangled around each other at night the way they did as children. Only there's something different about it now, the two of them pressed so close it's as if they're trying to share one body, as well.

Alfred smiles at the woman with the hatpin, and after a few drinks at the bar, she leaves on his arm, whispering in his ear that she has a room nearby.

It's so late by the time Alfred finally makes it back to their lodgings that he expects Fallon will be asleep. He opens the door as quietly as he can. It's dark inside, and he doesn't notice Fallon at first, sitting in the chair by the window. Doesn't realize until he speaks.

"Where have you been?" Fallon's voice is low and rough, and it suddenly makes Alfred think of Maude.

"None of your business," Alfred snaps, because he never wants to be reminded of Maude.

Fallon's expression is lost in the shadows, but Alfred can see him rise to his feet and start to move closer. Alfred squeezes his hands into fists. He's never had that reaction to his brother in his life, and there's a stiletto ache in his chest, as if something has cut him. Fallon keeps coming, but he doesn't raise his hand against Alfred. He just leans in close and presses his nose against Alfred's neck. "You stink of gin and pussy."

"I said it's none—"

Fallon grabs his arm hard, and the words die on Alfred's tongue. "Everything about you is my business, and I want that stink off you."

He grabs a wet cloth from the washstand and pulls violently at Alfred's clothes. He gets the jacket off and the shirt open, starts to rub the cloth over Alfred's skin, not gently.

"Stop it." Alfred pushes at him.

Fallon isn't deterred, keeps right on scrubbing, and Alfred shoves him harder. They tumble to the floor and roll around.

"Get off!" Alfred hisses.

But Fallon clearly has no intention of it. He manages to get Alfred's trousers undone, shoves the washcloth into his underclothes, over his cock, down over his balls. The rough cotton of the cloth and the pressure of his brother's hand, and Alfred can't help responding to it. His cock fills, and there's a hot ache suddenly burning in the pit of his stomach. Fallon shifts, and then Alfred can feel heat and hardness against his thigh. He goes still beneath his brother's hands.

"There's only one of us," Fallon reminds him softly, his breath hot against the side of Alfred's face. "What's yours is mine. You kissed that whore. You owe me a kiss."

Alfred's heart slams in his chest. He can taste fear in the back of his throat, but there's also a strange rightness to it. Here is where the tidal drift has been taking them. Here, quite possibly, is the reason that Alfred went home with that woman in the first place. Even the most inevitable process needs a catalyst.

He pushes up onto one elbow and presses his mouth to his brother's. Fallon's lips are soft and warm and part for him so sweetly. Kisses have always been easy come, easy go. Alfred doesn't remember what any of them tasted like or how they felt, not the first girl he kissed, not the woman with the hatpin only hours ago. But he'll never forget anything about kissing his brother, the way Fallon's mouth just instinctively molds to his, the shivery play of tongue against tongue, how Fallon bites a little as he kisses. It's as if Alfred has always known how this would feel, as if he was born waiting for it to happen.

"Did she take your clothes off?" Fallon whispers against his ear.

Alfred's cock jerks at the words, and that's apparently all the confirmation Fallon needs.

"Go on then," Fallon coaxes.

Alfred's hands shake as he unbuttons his brother's shirt and slips it from his shoulders, as he skims the undershirt up over his head, as he fumbles with his belt, gets it undone at last, pushes the trousers and underclothes down his long legs. Fallon kicks them free and then he finishes what he started undressing Alfred.

Fallon kisses Alfred's neck lazily, making him tremble. "There was touching, too."

It isn't a question, but Alfred nods anyway. Keeps on nodding as he drags his hands up his brother's back, smoothes his palms over Fallon's shoulders. Fallon moans softly and kisses Alfred again and starts to touch him in return. He traces the line of Alfred's cheek, circles his thumbs in the hollow of Alfred's collarbone, skims his fingers teasingly over Alfred's nipples, making Alfred arch his back.

"Did you use your mouth?" Alfred shivers, and Fallon kisses his throat. He can feel Fallon's smile on his skin. "Yes, you did."

Fallon peppers kisses across Alfred's chest and strokes a nipple with the flat of his tongue, making Alfred suck in a shaky breath.

"Yes," Fallon murmurs, as if he approves of the response.

He keeps kissing, down the line of Alfred's sternum, over the planes of his belly, and into the curls above his cock. There have been women who've slapped Alfred when he's asked for this, but Fallon doesn't hesitate. He licks exploringly at the head of Alfred's cock, makes a satisfied noise in the back of his throat, and then draws as much of the shaft into his mouth as he can. It's hot and wet and so good that Alfred bangs his head back against the floor.

The urge to thrust is nearly overwhelming, and Fallon rubs his hand over Alfred's hip, encouraging him. Alfred's hips stutter into motion, and Fallon takes it and takes it and takes it some more. A stray thought crosses Alfred's mind. _He's done this before._ But jealousy stabs at him, so he pushes that thought away, and concentrates on Fallon's mouth, Fallon's hands, the coiled pleasure building at the base of his own spine.

Before he can come, though, Fallon pulls off his cock.

"You don't have to tell me what else you did with her." He drags a finger behind Alfred's balls, along delicate skin, and circles Alfred's hole, lightly, not pushing in.

Alfred vaguely understands that men have sex with other men this way. From the pool halls and factories and feed stores where he's worked, he knows the dirty, filthy names such men get called, but they aren't him. They aren't Fallon. No one is like them. He opens his legs wider for his brother.

Fallon kisses him, quick and hard, and reaches for the little bottle of hair oil on the washstand. Alfred closes his eyes, and Fallon touches him between his legs again, his fingers slick now and more insistent. There's pressure and then the slow burn of being penetrated. Alfred's hips snap forward, as if they have a will of their own, driving Fallon's fingers deeper inside him.

"Mine," Fallon says, all the civilization seared out of his voice.

He pulls his fingers away, and Alfred makes a low, throaty noise of protest. There's a soft fleshy sound, Fallon slicking his cock. Then he spreads Alfred's thighs as wide as they'll go, moves on top of him and pushes inside.

It hurts, but it's the best hurt Alfred has ever had. He tilts his head back, and Fallon kisses the delicate skin of his throat, licks and bites at it. Fallon starts to move, and Alfred gasps, his lungs burning. He can feel Fallon's pulse as if it's his own. He pushes up into his brother's thrusts and reaches for his cock, stroking himself. Fallon moves deeper inside him, and pain gives way to pleasure, Alfred's heart fluttering in his throat.

Alfred grips his brother's shoulders, fingers pressing against bone, into muscle. "Please."

"Look at me," Fallon commands.

Alfred opens his eyes, and then he's staring up into his own face. He bites his lip and comes in his hand, warm-wet spreading between their bodies. Fallon's hips lurch, his face twists with what looks almost like pain, and then he's calling Alfred's name and coming inside him.

They slump together on the floor until it grows too cold, and then they pick themselves up and stumble to the bed. They lie in each other's arms, not talking, because there's nothing to say. Fallon kisses Alfred and settles his head on Alfred's chest, lets out his breath and closes his eyes. Alfred brings his arms up around Fallon's shoulders. _Brother._ But that doesn't feel like enough.

Then he remembers what Fallon said when they were fucking. He threads his fingers through Fallon's hair, rubbing at his scalp. Fallon nestles closer against him, presses his lips to Alfred's throat. _Mine_ , Alfred thinks.


End file.
